All Shook Up: On Top of the Other Dangers, Texans Worry About Fracking-Induced Earthquakes

All Shook Up: On Top of the Other Dangers, Texans Worry About Fracking-Induced Earthquakes (VIDEO)

by Simone Sanner

Residents in the small town of Azle, Texas and the Reno area, northwest of Ft. Worth, are crying foul after at least thirty earthquakes have rocked the area since November of last year -- saying that fracking is to blame.

Fracking is the process of injecting chemicals into the ground in order to force the release of natural gas. The process is now being associated with seismic activity after it was linked to a series of earthquakes in Ohio in 2013.

Area residents swarmed a meeting of the Texas Railroad Commission this Tuesday to demand fracking be halted in their area, saying that it's simple math that the earthquakes are a result.

"The correlation of increased fracking wastewater disposal and increased earthquakes is blindingly obvious," said Sharon Wilson of the Earthworks Oil and Gas Accountability Project.

"We have three things that we’d like to ask for,” Wilson added. “We’d like to ask for wastewater injection to halt until the science exists to prevent related earthquakes; we’d like all seismic data collected to be publicly available online and in real time; [and] we’d like those responsible for the injection wells to be held presumptively liable for damages caused [by] earthquakes in the area.”

“If Texas regulators want to show that they’re not owned by the oil and gas industry,” Wilson said, they can “act now, study later.”

Massachusetts is now seeking a ten-year ban on fracking as knowledge of the earthquakes in Texas spreads.

Watch news coverage here courtesy WFAA:

Simone Sanner